
THE "LAWS" OF KANSAS. 



SPEECH 



OF THE 

HON. SCHUYLEE COLFAX 

OP INDIANA. 



m THE HOUSE OF KEPEESENTATIVES, JUjnE 21, 185(5. 



S[r Ohatrman : I desire to give notice that I 
shall move, when we reach the third clause of 
the pending Army bill, the following amend- 
ment ; and I read it now, because the remarks 
I shall make to-day are designed to show its 
necessity ; 

" But Congress, hereby disapproving of the code of alleg- 
ed laws officially communicuted to them by the President, 
and wliich are represented to have been enacted by a budy 
claiming to be the Territorial Legislature of Kansas ; and 
also disapproving of the manner in which said alleged laws 
have been enforced by the authorities of said Territory, ex- 
pressly declare that, until these alleged laws shall have been 
affirmed by the Senate ami House of Representatives as 
having been enacted by a legal Legislature, chosen In con- 
formity with the organic law by the people of Kansas, no 
part of the military force of the United States shall be em- 
ployed in aid of their en'forcement ; nor shall any citizen of 
Kansas be required, under their provisions, to act as a part 
of the/)os.56 cfymltatun of any officer acting as marshal or 
sheriff in said Territory." 

'hlx especial object to-day is to speak relative 
to this code of laws, now in my hand, which 
has emanated from a so-called Legislative 
Assembly of Kansas ; and for the making of 
which your constilutents, in common with 
mine, have paid their proportion — the whole 
having been paid for out of the Treasury of 
United States. In speaking of the provisions 
embodied in this voluminous document, and of 
the manner in which these " laws" have been 
enforced, I may feel it my duty to use plain ; 



and direct language ; and I find my exemplar, 
as well as my jusfiflcation for it, in the unlim- 
ited freedom of debate which, from the first 
day of the session, has been claimed and exer- 
cised by gentlemen of the other side of the 
House. And, recognizing that freedom of de- 
bate as we liave, to the fullest extent, subject 
only to the rules of the House, we intend to 
exercise it on this side, when we may s-ee fit to 
do so, in the same ample manner. Hence, 
when we have been so frequently called " fa- 
natics," and other epithets of denunciation, no 
one, on these seats, has even called gentle- 
men of the other side to order. AVhen it has 
pleased them to denounce us as Black Repub- 
licans or colored Republicans, we have taken 
no exception to the attack, for we regard free- 
dom of speech as one of the pillars of our 
free institutions. "When, not content with 
this, tliey have chargei us with implied perju- 
ry, in being liostile to the Constitution, and 
unfaithful to tlie Union, we have been content 
to leave the world to judge between us and 
our accusers — a scrutiny in which principles 
will have more weiglit than denunciation. In 
spite of all these attacks we have not been 
moved to any attempt to restrict the perfect 
and most unlimited freedom of speech on the 
part of our denouncers ; for we acknowledged 
the truth of Jefferson's sentiment that "Error 



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ceases to be dangerous when Reason is left 
free to combat it." 

If that con^^titutional safeguard of our rights 
and liberties, free speech in debate, is to be 
recognized anywhere, it should certainly be 
recognized, enforced and protected in this 
House. Every representative of a free con- 
stituency, if worthy of tliat responsible posi- 
tion, should speak here at all times, not with 
'' bated breath," but openly and fearlessly, the 
sentiments of that constituency; for, sir, it is 
not alone the two hundred and thirty-four 
members of this House who mingle in this 
arena of debate ; but here, within this bar, are 
the teeming millions of American freemen, not 
individually participating, as in Athens in the 
olden time, in the enactment of laws and the 
discussion and settlement of tlie foreign and 
domestic policy of the nation ; but still, sir, 
participating in the persons of tiieir represen- 
tatives, whom they have commissioned to 
speak for them, in the important questions 
"wliich are presented for our consideration. 
Here, in this august presence, before the 
whole American people, thus represented, 
stand, and must ever stand. States and states- 
men, legislators and jurists, parties and princi- 
ples, to be subject to the severest scrutiny and 
the most searching review. Here Alabama ar- 
raigns Massachusetts, as she has done through 
the mouth of one of her Representatives but 
a few weeks since; and here Massachusetts has 
equally the right to arraign any other State of 
the Confederacy. And while the Republic 
stands, that freedom of debate, guaranteed and 
protected by the Constitution, must and will 
be sustained and enforced on this floor. 

Mr. Oiiairman, I feel compelled, on this oc- 
casion, therefore, by truth, and by a conscien- 
tious conviction of what I know to be the 
feelings of my constituents — for whom I speak 
as much as I do for myself — to denounce, as I 
do this day, the " code" of the so-called Legis- 
lature of Kansas as a code of tyranny and op- 
pression, a code of outrage and of wrong, 
which would disgrace the Legislature of any 
State of the Union, as it disgraces the Goths 
and Vandals, who, after invading and conquer- 
ing the Territory, thus attempted to play the 
despot over its people, and to make the white 
citizens of Kansas greater slaves than the 
blacks of Missouri. No man can examine the 
decrees of Louis Napoleon, no matter how 
Ignorant he may have been of the procession 
of events in France for the past six years, with- 
out having the conviction forced upon his mind 
that they emanated from a usurper and a despot. 
The very enactments embodied in these de- 
crees bear testimony against him. The limita- 
tions on the right of the subject ; the mockery 
of the pretended freedom of elections which 
he has vouchsafed to the people ; tlie rigid 
censorship of the press ; the shackles upon the 



freedom of speech ; all combine to prove that 
they emanate from an autocrat, who. however 
men may differ as to the wisdom of his states- 
manship, undoubtedly governs France with a 
strong arm and an iron rule. And so, sir, no 
unprejudiced man can rise from a candid peru- 
sal of this code without being thorouglily con- 
vinced that it never emanated from a Legisla- 
ture voluntarily chosen by the people whom it 
professes to govern ; but that it was dictated 
and enacted by usurpers and tyrants, whose 
leading object was to crush out some senti- 
ment predominant amongst that people, but 
distasteful and olFensive to these usurping legis- 
lators. I know this is a strong assertion ; but, 
in the hour of your time which I shall occupy, 
I shall prove this assertion from the intrinsic 
evidence of tlie code itself. 

Before I proceed to make an analysis of 
these laws, which I hold were never legally 
enacted, were never fit to be made, nor fit to 
be obeyed by a free people, let nje say a few 
words in regard to the manner in which they 
have bt-en administered and enforced. We 
have heard of murder after murder in Kansa.s 
— murders of men for the singular crime of 
preferring freedom to slavery ; but you have 
not heard of one single attempt by any court 
in that Territory to indict any one of those 
murderers. Tiie bodies of Jones, of Dow, of 
Barber, and others, murdered in cold blood, 
are moldering away and joining the silent 
dust; while one of the murderers this very 
day holds a territorial office in Kansas, and 
another of them holds an office of influence 
and rank under the authority of the General 
Government; while neither the Territorial nor 
the General Government inquire into the 
crimes they have committed, or the justifica- 
tion for their brothers' blood that stains their 
hands. 

I wish first, Mr. Chairman, to speak of the 
manner in which the chief justice, sitting as 
the supreme judicial officer of the Territory of 
Kansas, has performed the functions of his 
office. I have no imputation to make upon 
him as a man of moral character or of judicial 
ability. I know nothing in regard to either. 
I do not say he has willfully and corruptly 
violated his official oath ; for I can say that 
authoritatively in only one way, and tliat is, by 
voting for his impeachment. I shall not com- 
ment, sir, on the extraordinary manner in 
which he has enforced the Kansas code, with 
Draconian severity, against all who advocated 
freedom for Kansas, but with a serene leniency 
towards all who did not: pushing its severest 
provisions to the extremest point in the one 
case, and forgetting, apparently, that it con- 
tains any penalties whatever in the other. 
But I desire to draw the attention of tlie 
House to the fact, proven by the code itself, 
that this " Legislature " have used every ex- 



3 



ertion within their power to make that judge 
the interested champion and advocate of the 
vaHdity of their enactments. Pecuniary in- 
terest, sir, is a powerful argument with man- 
kind generally. We all see, and we all recog- 
nize this fact as a truism which no logician 
denies. The administration that gives a man 
an extensive or a profitable contract may rea- 
sonably expect to find in him a supporter. The 
Legislature that confers on a man a valuable 
charter would have a right to feel surprised if 
he did not decide in favor of the legality and 
the constitutionality of their enactments ; as 
well as use all of his influence in their favor, 
!i their authority to act as grantors was dis- 
puted, and if his charter fell to the ground as 
worthless, in oase their right to grant it was 
overthrown. It is true, some men are so pure 
as not to be aflfected by such things ; but in 
the generality of cases, the human mind can- 
not fail to be thus influenced, even if it is not 
absoluteiy controlled. 

Now, if you will turn to the concluding 
portion of this " code of laws," you will find 
on* hundred and forty pages of it, over one 
sixth of the whole, devoted to corporations, 
•shingled in profusion over the whole Territory, 
granting charters for railroads, insurance com- 
panies, toll-bridges, ferries, universities, min- 
ing companies, plank roads, and, in fact, all 
kinds of charters that are of value to their 
recipients, and more, indeed, than will be need- 
ed there for many years. No less than four or 
five hundred person^ (not counting one hundred 
territorial road commissioners), have been thus 
incorporated, and have been made the recipi- 
ents of the bounty of that legislation of Kan- 
sas, making a great portion, if not all of them, 
interested advocates to sustain the legality of 
those laws now in dispute before the American 
people. I need scarcely add that the name of 
nearly every citizen of Kansas who has been 
conspicuous in the recent bloody scenes in that 
Territory on the side of slavery, can be found 
among the favored grantees ; and all of them 
know that, if that Legislature is proved to be 
illegal and fraudulent, their grants become 
valueless. 

In quoting from this code of the laws of the 
Legislature of Kansas, I desire to state that I 
quote from Executive document No. 23, sub- 
mitted to this House by the President of the 
United States, and printed by the public 
printer of Congress. It is entitled "Laws of 
tlie Territory of Kansas," and forms a volume 
of eigl.t hundred and twenty-three pages. I 
notice that many members have a copy of this 
code before them now; and as many people 
as they discuss these enactments around the 
heartiistone at home, cannot believe that they 
are authentic, I will take pains to quote the 
section and page of every law I allude to, and 
will say to gentlemen upon the other side, 



that if they find me quoting incorrectly in a 
single instance, or in the minutest particular, 
essential or non-essential, I call upon tliem to 
correct me on the spot. I wish to lay the 
exact truth, no more, no less, from thip 
ofiicial record itself, authenticated as it is 
by the President of the United States him- 
self, before Congress and the American peo- 
ple. 

You will find in this code of laws that Mr. 
Isaacs, the district attorney of Kansas, figures 
in four acts of incorporation, and canr.ot fail, 
therefore, to believe in the legality ot their en- 
actment. Mr. L. N. Reese figures in three 
more; Mr. L, J. Eastin in three; Stringfellow 
in three, of course ; and R. R. Reese in five — 
all of them earnest defenders of the code and 
its provisions, as might be expected. But I 
desire more particularly to show you the incor- 
porations in which the territory of Kansas have 
given an interest to the chief justice of the ter- 
ritory^ Judge Lecompte, sitting though he does 
upon the judicial bench, to decide upon the 
validity of these territorial laws. You will 
find him, on page 788, incorporated as one of 
the regents of the Kansas University ; but I 
pass by that as of very little moment. At 
page 760 you will find a charter for the Cen- 
tral Railroad Company, with a capital of 
$1,000,000, in which S. A. Lecompte is one 
of the corporators. The chief justice's name 
is S. D. Lecompte; and as I cannot hear of any 
other person of the name of Lecompte in the 
territory, I have no doubt that tliis is a mis- 
print in the middle initial, and that his name 
was intended. But I will give him the benefit 
of the doubt, and pass over this charter. On 
page 769 you will find another charter, in 
which Chief Justice S. D. Lecompte figures as 
a corporator. It is the cliarter of the Leaven- 
worth, Pawnee, and Western Railroad, which, 
in the opinion of many, is destined to be a link 
in the great Pacific Railroad, or at least an im- 
portant section in one of its branches. It is 
chartered with a capital of |5,000,000, and five 
years' time is given for the grantees to com- 
mence the work. This charter, valuable as it 
must become, as the territory advances in popu- 
lation t.:>d wealth, is presented as a free gift 
to Judge Lecompte and hia associates by the 
mock Legislature of Kansas. Of course, in all 
these charters the directors are to open books 
for the subscription of stock, keeping them 
open " as long as they may deem proper ;" no 
barrie^ existing against their subscribing the 
whole stock themselves, the moment that the 
books are opened, if they choose so to do. 
But I desire to draw attention particularly to 
another grant, to be found on page 774, in 
which this same impartial judge, S. D. Le- 
compte, with nine other persons, are incorpo- 
rated as the Leavenworth and Lecompton rail- 
road ; and I ask you to notice, and explain, if 



4: 



you can, the difference which exists between 
that and other incorporations. 

In tlie first place, the other railroad charters 
are granted to certain persons in coHtinuou» 
succession. In this charier, witli a capital of 
$3,000,000, for a railroad from Leavenworth 
ti) his favorite city of Leconipton, (which was 
made the capital of the territory hy this same 
Legislature,) with an indefinite and unrestrain- 
ed power to build brunch railroads from the 
capital in any and every direction, Judge Le- 
compte and his associates, including Woodson, 
the Secretary of the Territory, are granted per- 
.petual succession. In section 21, page 777, 
there is this special exception, whiqh, though 
brief in its language, is momentous in its im- 
portance, for the benefit of Judge Lecompte 
«&0o.: 

" That sections seyen, thirteen, and twenty of article first, 
and so much of section eleren, article second, as relates to 
stock owned, of an act concerning corporations, shall not 
apply to this act." 

In the exa'.nination which I gave to these 
laws, it struck me that tliis exception of this 
charter, for the benefit of Lecompton and Le- 
compte, from the provisions of the general law 
relative to corporations, was singular, to say 
the least; and I turned back to the general 
law to see the character of the provisions thus 
suspended, so far as this act was concerned; 
and tlie proof that it furnishes of the intention, 
on the part of the Legislature, to make Judge 
Lecompte interested in their behalf, is so 
strong, that I will refer you to these sections 
as circumstantial evidence of no ordinary 
character. 

Section seven of the general corporation 
law, (see page 164,) provides as follows: 

" The charter of every corporation that shall hereafter 
be granted by law, shall be subject to alteration, suspen- 
sion, or repeal by any succeeding Legislature : Provided, 
Such alteration, suspension, or repeal, shall In nowise con- 
flict with any right vested in such corporation by its 
charter." 

But in Lecompte's charter, the power even 
to amend it, is, by the suspension of the above 
section, withheld from " any succeeding Legis- 
lature," even if said Legislature, or the peo- 
ple of Kansas, unanimoz^aiy aesired its amend- 
ment. 

Section thirteen (see page 165) makes tlie 
stockholders of all corporations individually 
Viable for its debts. Bat this ^oo, is sus- 
pended by the mock Legislature of Kansas, 
for the benefit of Judge Lecompte. 

Section twenty (see page 166) makes direc- 
tors liable for debts incurred by them exceed- 
ing the capital stock. But this, also, is sus- 
pended in Judge Lecompte's charter, and he is 
on« of the directors of the road. 

But there is still another extraordinary pro- 
vision in this charter, which I find in no other 



grant of this Legislature. Section fifteen (page 
776) provides : 

" If said company shall require for the construction or 
repair of said road, any stone, gravel, or other materials 
from the land of any person adjoining to or near said 
road, and cannot contract for the same with the owner 
thereof, said company may proceed to take possession ol 
and use the same, and have the property assessed," &c. 

Not only are they empowered to take stono, 
gravel, and other materials, including timber 
of such great value in Kansas, from land 
through which the road rnns, but also from 
"a^oining" tracts; and still furtlier, fro'i 
tracts " near said road," which may be con- 
strued to mean one mile, or five miles, or ten 
miles oft", as the case may be. And if the 
owner refuses to part with his ti:nber or 
gravel, the company are authorized to take it 
first, and pay for it afterwards; and the man 
who resists, and seeks to protect his own pro- 
perty, would be amenable to the penalties of 
this bloody code for resisting the "laws of 
Kansas." "What was the object of these extra- 
ordinary grants and privileges to Judge Le- 
com[)te and his associates, I submit for the 
American people to decide. 

Before I leave this Judge — the central figure 
as he is of the group of men in Kansas, who 
are using the power of the judiciary as it was 
used during " the bloody assizes" in England, 
and Reign of Terror in France, to enforce the 
decrees of tyranny — I must call attention to 
tlie last charge to the grand jury which be 
addressed in Kansas ; and in which, instead 
of alluding to the destruction of property of 
free-State men by unauthorized mobs ; to the 
tarring and feathering, and other personal 
outrages, to which many of them had beeu 
subjected; to the repeated invasions of the 
Territory by armed marauders, of which he 
had been a witness ; and to the murders of 
unotfending free-State men, of wiiich he could 
not have failed to hear ; his virtuous desire to 
uphold "the laws" found vent in another 
direction — the direction of persecution instead 
of protection. I quote from tiiis extraordinary 
charge, as published in the National Intelli- 
gencer of this city, of June 5, 1856, the lol 
lowing extraordinary paragraphs : 

" This Territory was organized by an act of Congreps, 
and, so far, its authority is from the United States. It has 
a Legislature, elected in pursuance of that organic ai-t. 
This Legislature, being an iustruioent of Congress, by which 
it governs the Territory, has [lassod laws. These laws, 
therefore, are of United Stattt imViarity und making; 
and all that resist these laws resist the power arid authority 
of the United Stales, and are therefore gxUUy of high, 
treason. 

" Now, gentlemen, if you find that any persons have re- 
sisted these laws, then you must, under your oaths, find 
bills against sucn persons for high treason. If you find 
that no such resistance has been made, but that combina- 
tions have been formed for the purpose of resisting them, 
and Individuals of influence and notoriety li.ive been aiding 
and abetting in such combinations, then mti^it you still find 
biUs for eonstructive treason," &c., Ac. 

Mr. Chairman, I am no lawyer ; but I think 



I understand the force of the English language ; 
and when I read in the Constitution of the 
United States that " Treason against the United 
States shall consist only in levying war against 
them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving 
them aid and comfort," I do not hesitate to 
brand that charge of Judge Lecompte, under 
which Governor Eobiuson was indicted for 
treason, and is now under coutinement and re- 
fused bail, as grossly, palpably unjust, and 
wliolly unauthorized by the Constitution. To 
concede his argument, that to resist, or " to 
form the purpo- j of resisting,'' tiie territorial 
laws is treasoa against the United States 
because Congress authorized a Legislature to 
pass laws, leads you irresistibly to the ad- 
ditional position, that to resist the orders of 
tlie country boards created by that Legisla- 
ture is also treason, for these boards are but 
one further remove from the fountain-head of 
power. And thus, sir, " the extreme medi- 
cine of the Constitution would become its 
daily bread ;" and the man who even objected 
to the opening of a road through his premises, 
w'ould be subject to the pains and penalties of 
treason, No, sir, that charge is only another 
link in the chain of tyranny, wliich the pro- 
slavery rulers of that Territory are encoiling 
around its people. And when the defenders 
of these proceedings ask us to trust to the 
impartiality of courts, I answer them by point- 
ing to this charge, and also to the judicial de- 
crees of the Territory, by authority of which 
numbers of faithful citizens of the United 
States have been indicted, imprisoned and 
harassed — by authority of which the town of 
Lawrence was sacked and bombarded — by 
authority of which printing presses were de- 
stroyed, without legal notice to their owners, 
and costly buildings cannonaded and consumed, 
without giving the slightest opportunity to 
their proprietors to be heard in opposition to 
these decrees ; all part and parcel of the plot 
to drive out tlie friends of freedom from the 
Territory, so that slavery might take unre- 
sisted possession of its villages and plains. 

It might have been supposed that, one of 
those riglits dear to all American freemen — 
the trial by an impartial jury — would have 
been left for the people of Kansas unimpaired. 
But when the invaders and conquerors of Kan- 
sas, in their border ruffian Legislature, struck 
down all the rights of freemen, they did not 
even leave them this, with which tiiey might 
possibly have had some chance of justice, 
even against the hostility of Presidents, tlie 
tyranny of Governors, and the hatred of 
judges. No jurors, sir, are drawn by lot in 
the Territory. But tlie first section ot the act 
concerning jurors (see page 377) enacts that 
" all courts, before whom jurors are required, 
may order the marshal, sheriff or other oflScer, 
to summon a sufficient number of jurors." 



The whole matter is left to the discretion of 
these officers; and Marshal Donaldson or 
" Sheriflf Jones" pack juries with just such 
men as they prefer, and whom they know will 
be their willing instruments. For a free-State 
man to hope for justice from such a jury 
charged by such a judge as Lecompte, would 
be to ask that the miracle by which the three 
Israelites passed through the fiery furnace of 
their persecutors unscathed, should be daily 
re-enacted in the jurisprudence of Kansas 
Nay, more, sir, to make assurance doubly 
sure, the same law in regard to jurors ex- 
cludes all but pro-slavery rnen from the jurj-- 
box in all cases relating directly or indirectly 
to slavery ; for here is its thirteenth section, 
(page 378 :) 

•' No person who is conscientiously opposed to the holding 
slaves, or who does not admit the right to hold slaves in 
this Territory, shall be a juror in any cause in which the 
right to hold any person in slavery is involved, nor in any 
cause in which any injury done to, or committed by, any 
slave is in issue, nor in any criminal proceeding for the 
violation of any law enacted for the protection of slave 
property, and for the punishment of crime committed 
against the right to such property." 

I leave this dark picture of the jurispru- 
dence of Kansas, and turn now to the laws 
themselves — " laws " that were, as late as the 
9th of February. 1856, over two months after 
the opening of this session, thus spoken of by 
the Detroit Free Press, the organ of General 
Cass, and one of the leading Democratic pa- 
pers of the Nortltwest : 

" But the President should pause long before treating as 
' treasonable insurrection ' the action of those inhabitants 
of Kansas who deny the binding authority of the Missouri- 
Kansas Legislature ; for, in our humble opinion, a people 
that would not be inclined to rebel against the acts of a 
legislative hoAj forced upmi thein hy fraud and violence, 
would he nmivortky the ntime of American. If there was 
ever JHstifiHhle cause for popular rei'olutimi against a 
■usurping and obnoxious Government, that cause has 
existed in, Kansas." 

The President of tlie United States has de- 
clared, in his special message to Congress, in 
his proclamation, and in his orders to Gover- 
nor Shannon and Colonel Sumner, through his 
Secretary of State and Secretary of "War, that 
this code of territorial laws is to be enforced 
by the full exercise of his power. He has, of, 
course, read them, and knows of their pro- 
visions. He must know that they trample 
even on the organic law, which his otficial sig- 
nature breathed into life. He must know that 
they trample on the Constitution of tlie United 
States, which he and we have sworn to sup- 
port. Reading them as he has, he could have 
chosen rather to support the law of Congress 
and the national Constitution ; but he prefer- 
red to declare publicly his intention of assist- 
ing, with all his power and authority, the 
enforcement of this code, which repudiates 
both. The National Democratic Convention 
also, at Cincinnati, denounced " treason and 



6. 



armed resistance to the laws" in a niarked and 
.<Iiecial manner ; and if there was any doubt 
as to the object of this denunciation, the speech 
of the author of the Nebraska bill himself, Mr. 
Douglas, at the ratification meeting in this 
city, a few nights since, shows plainly its 
" ilitent and meaning." Wishing to do no in- 
in>tice to any one, I quote from his speech, as 
reported in the national Democratic organ 
licre, the Wa^hingion Union, of June 10, which 
I liold in my hand : 

" The platform was equally explicit in reference to the dis- 
turbances in relation to the Territory of Kansas. It de- 
clared that treason was to be punished, and resistance to the 
laws was to be put down.'" ♦ » • • 

" He rejoiced that the convention, by a unanimous Tote, 
lad approved of the creed that law must and shall prevail. 
fApplaiise.] He rtyoiced that we had a standard-bearer 
[Mr. Buchanan] with so much wisdom and nerve as to 
enforce a firm and undivided execution of those laict." 

And Mr. Buchanan, after the nomination, 
rephed to the Keystone Club, who called on 
liiin on their return from Cincinnati, as fol- 
li^)ws : 

" Gentlemen, two weeks since I should have made yon a 
longer speech, but now 1 have been placed upon a platform 
of which I most heartily approve, and that can speak for me. 
Heing the representative of the great Democratic party, and 
not simply James Buchanan, I must square my conduct ac- 
cording to the platform of that party, and insert no new 
plank, nor take one from it. That platform Is BulBciently 
broad and national for the whole Democratic party." 

I sliall now proceed to show you no less than 
geten palpahle violations of the organic law 
(the Nebraska bill), incorporated into this code 
by the bogus Legislature which enacted it. 
The President, Judge Douglas, and Mr. Buchan- 
an, who are all pledged "to enforce these ter- 
ritorial laws," cannot have failed to notice that 
tiie conquerors of Kansas enacted their code, 
regardless of whether its provisions coincided 
witii the organic hiw or not; but, neverthe- 
less, where they differ, the law of the United 
States is to be forgotten, aad the pro-slavery 
behests of the Kansas invaders are to be car- 
ried out at the point of the bayonet, if neces- 
sary. 

First. Section twenty-two of the Ne- 
braska bill enacts that the House of Eepresen- 
tativos in Kansas shall consist of twenty-six 
members, " whose term of service shall con- 
tinue one year.'''' That does not mean eighteen, 
nineteen or twenty months, but "one year," 
and one year only. The Legislature of Kansas 
was elected on the 80th day of March, 1855 — 
a day which has become famous for the discus- 
sions in this House and elsewhere in regard to 
it; ap'^ ..., if you will turn to page 280 of 
this Ivansas code, you will see that there is not 
to be an election for members of the lower 
House of the Legislature until the first Monday 
in October, in the year 1856 — over eighteen 
months after the first Legislature was elected. 
If you turn, then, to page 403, you will find 
Uiat no regular session of that Legislature is to 



be held until January, 1857 ; so that the terra 
of that House of Representatives, in defiance 
of the organic law, is prolonged to twenty- 
two months instead of twelve months. Sir, 
their term has expired now. There is no Leg- 
islature in the Territory of Kansas this day ; 
and therefore, in the language of the Declara- 
tion of Independence, " the legislative power.-*, 
incapable of annihilation, iiave returned to the 
people at large for their exercise." For exer- 
cising them, however, in no conflict with the 
territorial government, but carefully avt)idiiig 
it, and abstaining from putting any legislation 
in force, but only organizing as a State to apply 
for admission here as "a redress for their griev- 
ances" — for doing this, the court of Judge 
Lecompte arraigns them for treason, and scat- 
ters its indictments all over the Territory. 

Second. The same section of the Kansas 
organic law says that the members of the 
council shall serve for "two years;" but their 
term has been prolonged in the same manner 
io nearly three years, so that the councilors 
elected in March, 1855. remain in ofhce until 
the 1st of January, 1858, longer than a mem- 
ber of this House holds his seat by the author- 
ity of his constituents. And it is to this Leg- 
islature, tlie Senatorial branch of which, even 
if legally elected, should expire in nine months 
from this time, but which, in defiance cf the 
organic law, have taken upon themselves to 
extend their terra to a period nineteen months 
distant, that Judge Douglas desires, in his bill, 
to submit the question of when a census shall 
be taken preparatory to admission as a State, 
and to clothe them with the superintendence 
of the raovements in the Territory, prelimina- 
ry to said admission. When we have investi- 
gated to-day the "constitutionality," the 
"justice," the "impartiality," the "humanity" 
of their acts thus far, no one will need to a.sk, 
why I am not willing, for one, to give them 
the slightest degree of power or authority 
hereafter, but, on the contrary, desire to take 
frora them that which they have illegally 
usurped and tyrannically exercised. 

But if to these two points, it is replied, that 
the term of the House of Representatives was 
intended by this mock Legislature to expire 
on the 30th of March, 1856, ten months before 
the new House takes its seat, and the Council, 
in Marcli, 1857, ten months before the new 
Council meets, it follows that, though the Ne- 
braska bill extended "popular sovereignty" by 
giving the President absolute control of two of 
tlie three branches of the Government, the 
executive and judicial, and left to the people 
only the legislative, subject to a two-thirds 
veto of the President's Governor, this Legis- 
lature so legislates that tliere is no House of 
Representatives there from March 1856 to 
January 1857, and no Council from March, 
1857, to January 1858 — in a word, so tliat 



there can be no Legislature in the Territory 
from March, 1856, to January, 1858, except 
from January to March, 1857, bakkly two 

MONTHS OUT OF TWKNTT-TWO ! 

Third. The next violation of the organic 
law is the enacting of a fugitive slave law in 
that Territory, although, by section twenty- 
eight of the Nebraska bill, the fugitive slave 
law of the United States was declared "to ex- 
tend and be in full force within the limits of 
the territory of Kansas." This is one of the 
violations that I do not complain much about, 
fur in some respects the territorial law is 
milder than the national one and requires the 
slave claimant to pay the costs in advance ; but 
I allude to it to show the utter recklessness of 
the Kansas legislators and their disregard of 
the law of Congress. By this law (sections 
28 and 29, page 329), persons are prohibited 
from taking fugitives from tlie Territory, ex- 
cept in accordance with its provisions, and are 
fined $500 if they do so. 

Fourth. The expenses of the Territory are 
paid, as is well known, out of the National 
Treasury ; and section thirty of the Nebraska 
bill enacts that the chief clerk of the Legisla- 
ture shall receive four dollars per day, and the 
other clerks three dollars per day. But on 
page 444 of the Kansas code, you will find an 
extra douceur to tlie clerks of fifteen and 
twenty cents per hundred words for indexing 
and copying journals; on page 145, another 
law, declaring that if the Secretary (then act- 
ing as Governor after Governor Reeder's re- 
moval), should refuse his assent to the ebove, 
the chief and assistant clerks should receive 
$100 each out of the Treasury, besides their 
per diem ; and on the next page, page 146, the 
pay of the enrolling and engrossing clerks is 
increased to four dollars per day, on the like 
contingency, although the organic law ex- 
pressly fixed it at three dollars per day. The 
legislators acted as if they had not only con- 
quered the people of Kansas, but the national 
Treasury also. 

Fifth. Section twenty-two of the organic 
law gives the Governor exclusively the right 
of determining who were elected members of 
the Legislature. He did so, throwing out 
about one-third of the members elected at the 
first election, the reign of terror and violence 
preventing more contests of other equally 
fraudulent returns. But the Legislature, when 
assembled, without examination of the merits 
of each case, and without authority to commit 
such an act at all, threw out all the members 
elected at the second election, and admitted in 
their stead those whose right to seats the 
Governor had expressly denied. 

Sixth. Section twenty-four of the organic 
law enacts : 

" That the legislative power of the Terrltorj shall extend 



to all the rightful subjects of legislatloo conslsteot with the 
Constitution of the United States ; but no law shall be 
passed Interfering with the primary disposal of the soil." 

But if you will turn ta page 600, you will 
see how coolly this bogus Legislature ignores 
both the Nebraska bill and the preemption 
law ; for it declares, as if they owned the soil, 
that in actions of trespass, ejectment, &c., 
settlers shall be protected in tlieir pi-eemptions, 
not of one hundred and sixty acres, but of 
three hundred and twenty acres ;" " that such 
claim may be located in two diiFerent parcels, 
to suit the convenience of the holder," " with- 
out being compelled to prove an actual enclo- 
sure ;" and the still more flagrant repudiation 
of the congressional preemption law, that 
" occupancy by tenant shall be considered 
equally valid as personal residence," under 
which the whole Territory may be pre-empted 
by Missourians. And this law, with the others, 
is to be enforced by the President ! 

Seventh. Section thirty of the Nebraska 
bill enacts that the ofl5cial oath to be taken by 
the Governor and secretary, the judges, " and 
all other civil officers in said Territory," shall 
be " to support the Constitution of the United 
States, and faithfully to discharge the duties 
of their respective offices." No more — no less. 
But the legislators of Kansas, with the same 
disregard of the congressional law that mark- 
ed their other acts, enacted another kind of 
official oath on page 438 of their code, as fol- 
lows : 

"Sec. 1. All officers elected or appointed under any exist- 
ing or subsequently enacted laws of this Territory, shall 
take and subscribe the following oath of office: ' I, , 

do solemnly swear upon the Holy Evangelists of Almighty 
God, that I will support the Constitution of the United Slates 
and that I will support and sustain the provisions of an act 
entitled, *An act to organize the Territories of Nebraska and 
Kansas,' and the provisions of the law of the United States, 
commonly known as the * fugitive slave law,' and faithful- 
ly and impartially and to the best of my ability, demean 

myself in the discharge of my duties in the office of ; 

so help me God." 

You cannot fail to notice that in this new 
oath, framed by the bogus Legislature, the fu- 
gitive slave law is elevated to a "higher 
law," than the Constitution ; for the officer is 
merely to " support " the latter, but is re- 
quired to swear that he will " support and sna- 
tain," the other. 

Besides these seven palpable, flagrant and 
unconcealed violations of the organic .aw or- 
ganizing the Territory, I point you low to 
five equally direct and open violations of the 
Constitution of the United States ; for that in- 
strument has been trampled upon as reckless- 
ly as the laws of Congress. 

Ifirst. The very first amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States prohibits 
the passage of any law "abridging the free- 
dom of speech ;" and it is a significant fact, as 
can be learned from Hickey's Constitution, 
page 33, that this with a number of other 



8 



amendments to the Constitution which follow 
it, was submitted by Congress to the various 
States in 1789, immediately after the adoption 
of the Constitution itself, with the following 
preamble : 

" The conventions of a number of States having, at tlie 
llrae of ttieir adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, 
In ord«r to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its power, 
that ' further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be 
added.' " 

Therefore the amendments that followed 
were proposed. 

Thus it is conclusively proven that the 
amendment, prohibiting any abridgment of 
the freedom of j^peech, was adopted to pre- 
vent an " abuse of power," which our forefa- 
thers feared miglit be attempted by some de- 
generate descendants at some later period of 
our history. But, tliough they thus sought 
to [ireserve and protect free speech by consti- 
tutional provision, their prophetic fears have 
been realized by the enactors of the Kansas 
code. Its one hundred and fifty-first chapter 
on pages 604 and 605, is entitled " An act to 
punish offences against slave property;" and 
there is no decree of Austrian despot or Rus- 
sian Czar which is not mercifid, in comparison 
with its provisions. Here, sir, in the very 
teeth of the Constitution, is section twelve of 
that chapter : 

"If any free person, by speaking or by writing, assert 
or mnintiiin tliat persons have not the right to hold slaves 
In this Territory, or shall introduce into this Territory, 
print, publish, write, circulate or cause to be introduced into 
this Territory, written, printed, published or circulated in 
this Territory, any book, paper, magazine, pamphlet, or 
circular, containing any denial of the right of persons 
to hold slaves in this Territory, such persons shall be 
deemed guilty of felony and shall be punished by imprison- 
meot at hard labor fur a term of not less thaa two years. 

How many more than two years he shall be 
punished is left to the tender mercy of Judge 
Lecom]<te and the jury which "Slieriff" Jones" 
will select for their trial. The President of 
tlie United States has sworn to support the 
(lonstitutioa; but this, with the other " laws 
Oi .,'• :^r.^ '' are to be enforced by him, despite 
that Oonsiitutitin, witli the army of the United 
States ; and Mr. Buchanan is pledged by 
Judge Douglas to " the firm and undivided 
execution of those laws." But, sir, in a few 
short months tlie people, the free people of the 
Uniled States, will inaugurate an Administra- 
tion that will do justice to the oppressed set- 
tlers of Kansas, that will i-estore to them their 
betrayed rights, will vindicate the Constitu- 
tion, and will ])hice in the offices of trust of 
that ill-fated Territory men who will over- 
throw the " usiu'pation," gi^e their official in- 
fiiience to freedom and the rii^lit-^ ratlier than 
to slavery and the wrong, and protect rather 
tliati oppress the citizens whom tlioy are call- 
<'il upott to govern and to judge. 



Second. The same constitutional amendment 
prohibits the passage of any law "abriding the 
treedom of the press;" and here, sir, in flagrant 
violation of it, is the 11th section of the same 
law in the Kansas code, page 605 : 

"If any person print, write, introduce into, publish, or 
circulate, or cause to be brought into, printed, written, 
published, or circulated, or shall tiuowiiigty aid or assist iu 
bringing into, printing, publishing, or circulating, within 
this Territory, any book, paper, painplilet, magazine, hand- 
bill, or circular, containing any statements, arguments, 
opinions, sentiment, doctrine, advice, or innuendo, calcu- 
lated to produce a disorderly, dangerous, or rebellious dis- 
affection among the slaves in this Territory, or to induce 
such slaves to escape from the service of their masters, or 
to resist their authority, he shall be guilty of felony, and be 
punished by imprisonment and hard labor for a term not 
legs than five years." 

And, under this atrociously unconstitutional 
provision, a man who " brought into " the 
Territory of Kansas a copy of '' Jefiferson's 
Notes on Virginia," which contains an elo- 
quent and free-spoken condemnation of slavery, 
could be convicted by one of " Sheriff' Jones's " 
juries as having introduced a " book," contain- 
ing a " sentiment " " calculated " to make the 
slaves "disorderly," and sentenced to five 
years' hard labor. Probably under this provi- 
sion, as well as the charge of high treason, 
George W. Brown, editor of the Herald ot 
Freedom, at Lawrence, has, after his printing 
press has been destroyed by the order of Judge 
Lecompte's court, been himself indicted, and 
is now imprisoned, awaiting trial — kept, too, 
under such strict surveillance, far worse tliau 
murderers are treated in a civilized country, 
tliat even his mother and wife were not; allow- 
ed to visit him until he had humbly petitioned 
the Governor for permission. And this upon 
the soil of a Territory which our forefathers, 
in 1820, in this very llall, dedicated by solemn 
compact, to "freedom forever." 

Ikird. The sixth amendment to the Const! 
tution of the United States declares that, " In 
all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall 
enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, 
by an impartial jury," It is significant that, 
in the Constitution itself, it had been provided, 
(article 3, section 2,) that " the trial of all 
crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall 
be by jury." But, to prevent " abuse of 
power," this, with other amendments, were 
adopted, declaring that the trial shall bo by an 
imiiartial jury. I have already shown you 
liow impartially they are to be selected by 
sheriffs who go about and imitate, in their 
conduct towards free-State men, tlie example 
of Saul of Tarsus in his persecution of tlie 
early Christians, (Acts, chapter 8, verse 3, 
"entering into every house, and seizing men 
and women, committed them to prison ;") and 
I have quoted you a section, showing how 
impartially they are to constituted, with men 
on one side only ; but in this very chapter, the 
concluding provision, section thirteen, (page 



C06,) repeats this gross violation of the nation- 
al Constitution, as follows: 

" No person who is conscientiously opposed to holding 
slaves, or who does not admit the rigtit to hold slaves in this 
Territory, shall sit as a juror on the trial of any prosecution 
for any violation of any of the sections of this act." 

Here, sir, in tliese instances which I have 
quoted, stand the Constitution of the United 
States on the one side, and the Kansas code on 
the other, in direct and oi>en conflict — the one 
declaring that the freedom of speech shall not 
be abridged, that the freedom of the press 
shall be protected, that juries, above all things 
else, shall be entirely impartial; the other 
trampling all these safeguards under foot. And 
because a majority of the settlers there, driven 
from the polls by armed mobs, legislated over 
by a mob in whose election they had no 
agency, choose to stand by and maintain their 
rights under the Constitution, you have seen 
how anarchy and violence, how outrage and 
persecution have been running riot in that 
Territory; far exceeding in their tj^ranny and 
oppression the wrongs for which our revolution- 
ary forefatliers rose against the masters who 
oppressed them ; and yet, though the protec- 
tion they have had from the General Govern- 
ment has been only the same kind of protec- 
tion which the wolf gives to the lamb, they 
have, while repudiating the territorial sheriffs, 
bowed in submission to writs in the hands of 
the United States marshal, or when the sol- 
diers of the United States, yielding to orders 
which they do not deem it dishonorable for 
them to despise, assist in their execution. 
Such forbearance — such manifestations of their 
allegiance to the national authority — become 
the more wonderful when it is apparent as 
the noonday sun that every attempt has been 
made to harass them into resistance to the 
authority of the United States, so as to furnish 
a pretext, doubtless, for their indiscriminate 
imprisonment, expulsion, or massacre. 

Fourth. The Constitution also prohibits 
cruel and unusual punishments. I shall show, 
before I close, that this so-called Kansas Legis- 
lature has prescribed most cruel and nnusual 
punishments, unwarranted by the character of 
the offenses punished, and totally dispro- 
portioned to their criminality. 

Fifth. The Constitution declares (article 1, 
section 9) that " the privilege of the writ of 
habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless 
when, in cases of rebellion or invasion, the 
public safety may require it." But the Kan- 
sas code, in its chapter of habeas corpus (ar- 
ticle 3, section 8, page 345,) enacts as follows: 

" No negro or mulatto, held as a slave within this Terri- 
tory, or lawfully arrested as a fugitive from service from 
another State or Territory, shall be discharged, nor shall 
his right of freedom be had under the provisions of this 
act." 

This provision, suspending the writ of haheas 



corpus in the above cases is not only a viola 
tion of the Constitution, but also of organic 
law ; for that provided, in section 28, for 
appeals to the Supreme Court of the United 
States on writs of habeas corpus in cases in- 
volving the right of freedom, the issuing of 
which this territorial law expressly prohibits. 
The language of the Nebraska-Kansas act is as 
follows : 

" Except also that a writ of error or appeal shall also be 
allowed to the Supreme Court of the United States, from the 
decision of the said supreme court created by this act, or o( 
any judge thereof, or of the district courts created by this 
act, or of any judge thereof, upon any writ of habeas cor- 
pus, involving the question of persona! freedom." 

But the Kansas Legislature coolly set aside 
the law of the United States, by which alone 
their territorial organization was brought into 
existence, and effectually prohibited any ap- 
peal to the Supreme Court " upon any writ of 
habeas corpus, involving the question of per- 
sonal freedom," by declaring that the writ 
sha41 not be used in the Territory for any such 
purpose! 

Having now referred to a few of the many 
acts embraced in this code, which conflict with 
the Constitution or the organic law, I proceed 
to the examination of other provisions, some 
of which stamp it as a code of barbarity, as 
well as of tyranny — of inhumanity as well as 
of oppression. And first to "the imprison- 
ment at hard labor," which is made the 
punishment for "offenses against the slave 
property," in the sections which I have already 
quoted. The general understanding of the 
people at large has been that, as there was no 
State prison yet erected in Kansas, this im- 
prisonment would be in some Missouri prisons 
near the frontier. But, sir, sucli is not the 
case. The authors of these disgraceful and 
outrageous enactments, with a refinement of 
cruelty, provided that the "hard labor" 
should be in another way ; and that way will 
be found in chapter 22, entitled " an act pro- 
viding a system of confinement and hard 
labor," section 2 of which (page 147) reads as 
follows : 

" Every person who may be sentenced by a?.y court of 
competent jurisdiction, under any law in force within this 
Territory, to punishment by confinement and hard labor, 
shall be deemed a convict, and shall immediately, under the 
charge of the keeper of such jail or public prison, or under 
the charge of such person as the keeper of such jail or 
public prison may select, be put to hard labor, as in the 
first section of this act specified, [to wit, " on the streets, 
roads, public buildings, or other public works of the Terri- 
tory" — Sec. \. page 146:] and such keeper or other person 
having charge of such convict, shall cause such convict, 
while engaged at such labor, to be securely confined by a 
chain sia: feet i7i length, of not less than four-sixteenths 
nor more than three-eighths of an inch links, with a rmmd 
hall of iron, of not less than four nor more than six 
inches in diameter, attached, which chain shall be securely 
fastened to the ankle of such convict with a strong lock 
and key; and such keeper or other person having charge 
of such convict may, if necessary, confine such convict 
while so engaged at hard labor, by other chains, or other 
means, in his discretion, so as to keep such convict secure 
and prevent his escape ; and when there shall be itoo of 



10 



more convicts under the charge of such keeper , or other 
person, such coiiTlcts shall be fastened together by strong 
chains, with strong loclfs and keys, during the time such 
conylcts shall be engaged in hard labor without the walls of 
any Jail or prison." 

And this penalty, revolting, humiliating, de- 
basing as it is, subjecting a free American citi- 
zens to the public sneers and contumely of his 
oppressors, far worse than within the prison 
walls, where the degradation of the punish- 
ment is relieved by its privacy, is to be borne 
from one to five long years by the men of In- 
diana and Ohio, of New England and New 
York, of Pennsylvania and the far West, who 
dare in Kansas to declare by speech, or in 
print, or to introduce therein a handbill or 
paper, which declares that " persons have not 
the riglit to hold slaves in this Territory." 
The chain and ball are to be attached to the 
ankle of each, and they are to drag out their 
long penalty for exercising their God-given 
and constitutionally-protected freedom of 
speech, manacled together in couples, and 
working, in the public gaze, under task-mas- 
ters, to whom Algerine slaveholders would be 
preferable. 

Sir, as this is one of the laws which the 
Democratic party, by its platform, has re- 
solved to enforce, and which the President of 
the United States intends to execute, if needs 
be, with the whole armed force of the United 
States, I have procured a specimen of the size 
of the iron ball which is to be used in that 
Territory under this enactment, and only re- 
gret that I cannot exhibit also the iron chain, 
six feet in length, which is to be dragged with 
it, through the hot summer months, and the 
cold wintry snows, by the free-State "con- 
victs " in Kansas. [Here Mr. 0. exhibited a 
large and heavy iron ball, six inches in diame- 
ter, and eighteen inches in circumference.] 

Mr. Chairman, if the great men who have 
passed away to the Spirit-land could stir them- 
selves in their graves, and, coming back to 
life and action, should utter on the prairies of 
Kansas the sentiments declared by them in 
the past, how would they be amazed at the 
penalties that would await them on every 
side, for the utterance of their honest convic- 
tions on slavery. Said Washington to John F. 
Mercer, in 1786: 

*' I never mean, unless some particular circumstance 
should compel me to it, to possets another slave by pur- 
chase, It being among my first withes to see some plan 
adopted by which slavery In this countrjr mt.v be abolished 
by law." 

Said Jefferson, in his Notes on Virginia : 

" The whole commerce between master and slave Is a 
iDntinual exercise of the most unremitting despotism on the 
iDe part, and degrading submission on the other. • • « 
IVith what execration should the statesman be loaded, 
who, permitting one half of the citliens thus to trample on 
the rights of the other, transforms those Into despots, and 
these into enemies, destroys the morals of the one part, 
and the amor patri<e of the other 1 Can the liberties of a 



nation be thought secure, when we have removed their only 
firm basis— a conviction in the minds of the people that 
these liberties are the gift of God T That they are not 
violated but by his wrath? Indeed, I tremhle for my 
country when I reflect that God U just, and hU justice 
cannot akep forever." 

Surely, such language, in the eyes of a pro- 
slavery jury, would be considered as " calcu- 
lated '' to render slaves " disorderly." And 
surely, in the language of the President and 
his party, " the law must be enforced." Come, 
then, " Sheriff Jones," with your chain and 
ball for each of these founders of the Kepublic, 
and manacled together, let them, as they pur- 
sue their daily work, chant praises to " the 
great principle for which our revolutionary 
fathers fought," and of which the defenders of 
the Nebraska bill told us that law was the 
great embodiment. 

Said Mr. Webster in his Marshfield speech 
in 1848 : 

" I feel that there ii nothing ut^just, nothing of which 
any honest man can complain, if he is intelligent, and I feel 
that there is nothing of which the civilized world, if they 
take notice of so humble an individual as myself, will re- 
proach me when I say, as I said the other day, that I have 
made up my mind, for one, that under no circumstance will 
I consent to the extension of the area of slavery in the 
United States, or to the further increase of slave represen- 
tation in the Hoiiae of Representatives." 

And again, in 1850 : 

" Sir, wherever there is a particular good to be done — 
wherever there is a foot of laud to be staid back from be- 
coming slave territory — I am ready to assert the principle 
of the exclusion of slavery." 

Said the noble old statesman of Kentucky, 
Henry Clay, in 1850 : 

"1 have said that I never could vote for It myself; and I 
repeat, that I never can and never will vote, and no 
earthly power ever will make me vote to spread slavery 
over territory where it does cot exist." 

Surely, this too conflicts with the law of 
Kansas. Hurry them. Judge Lecompte, to 
the chain-gang; and as they commence their 
years of disgraceful and degrading punish- 
ment, forget not to read them from the Ne- 
braska Bill, that " its true intent and mean- 
ing" is " to leave the people thereof perfectly 
free (not only free, but perfectly free) to form 
and regulate their domestic institutions in 
their own way, subject only to the Constitu- 
tion of the United States." 

There is another portion of this act to 
which I wish to call special attention. It is 
tlie succeeding section to the above, (-^ec. 3, 
page 147): 

"Whenever any convict shall be employed at labor for 
any incorporate town or city, or any county, such town, 
city, or county, shall pay into the territorial treasury the 
sum of fifty cents for each convict, for every day such con- 
vict shall be engaged at such labor; and whenever such 
convict shall be employed upon private hiring at labor, it 
shall be at such price each, per day, as may be agreed upon 
with such keeper or other person having charge of such ; 
and the proceeds of said labor shall be collected by such 
keeper, and put Into the territorial treasury." 



11 



Not content with the degradation of the 
chain-gang, a system of white slavery is to be 
introduced by "private hiring," and the "con- 
victs," sentenced for the exercise of the free- 
dom of speech and of the press, are to be 
hired out during their servitude, if their 
" keeper " sees fit, to the heartless men who 
this day are hunting them from their homes, 
and burning their dwellings over their heads. 
But " the laws are to be executed ;" and 
though they are the offspring of the most 
gigantic fraud ever perpetrated upon a free 
people, if there is no change in the policy of 
th"e government, and if the party which con- 
trols its actions is not hurled from power, we 
shall, doubtless, next year see Governor Rob- 
inson (if not previously executed for treason) 
with the iron chain and ball to his ancle, 
hired from the convict-keeper by Governor 
Shannon to do his menial service, or to be 
punished, if he disobeys his master's orders, 
like a southern slave. And Judge Lecompte 
would have the privilege too, and would, 
doubtless, exercise it, of having Judge Wake- 
field as his hired serf^ dragging, for two or five 
years to «ome. his chain and ball after him as 
he entered his master's presence, or obeyed 
his master's command. And Marshal Donald- 
son, with " Sheriff Jones " and Stringfellow, 
would not certainly be behind their superiors 
in the retinue of free-State slaves whom they 
could satisfy their revenge upon by hiring as 
their menials from the keeper of the Kansas 
convicts. 

There are many things in this code of which 
I desire to speak, but which I will not have 
time to allude to, as my hour is rapidly pass- 
ing away, and I must hasten on. It is wor- 
thy of notice in passing, that in no place in 
this code is slavery expressl}' established in 
the territory. Instead of le?ving the people 
of the territory " perfectly free to form their 
own institutions," slavery is taken to be an 
institution already existing, as if it were 
already established by the Congress of the 
United States, In this initial legislation of the 
territory, it is treated as a heretofore recog- 
nized and permanent " institution." Thus, by 
page 60, slaves are to be appraised like other 
property of a decedent ; by page 298, slaves 
are to be taken in execution for debt ; by page 
432, mortgages of slaves are to be recorded ; 
by page 556, slaves are to be taxed by the 
assessors ; by page 630, slave-ovrners are to be 
accountable for trespasses by their slaves ; but 
nowhere in the code is to be found a single 
line or section, declaring that " Slavery," is 
hereby established. I have no idea that even 
if the legislature of Kansas was to be conceded 
a legal body, slavery this day has a legal 
existence in the territory. But to expect such 
a decision from its courts, would be to look for 
mercy from a Nero. 



As I was examining this Sahara of legisla- 
tion to find, if possible, one oasis, my eye fell 
upon chapter 74, page 323, headed with the 
attractive title of "frkkdom;" and I rejoiced 
at the certainty of finding something wortliy 
of approval in its provisions. But, alas! it is 
a fit associate for the rest. By it it appears 
that "a person held in slavery" cannot sue 
for his freedom till he first petitions the court 
tor leave to establish his right to freedom. If 
that leave is denied, whether he is legally or 
illegally held in slavery, no matter how clearly 
he could prove his freedom, yet, if the court 
withholds its permission, he has no alternative 
but to continue in slavery till death frees him 
from his unjust servitude. But if the court 
consent, he can only go on by giving security 
for the costs, when it is a conceded fact that, 
as a slave, he has not a dollar or a copper of 
his own in the world, and cannot even mort- 
gage his own labor for indemnification of his 
security. On page 325, section 12, of this same 
law, there is a singular provision : 

" If the plaintiff be a negro or mulatto, he is required to 
prove his right to freedom." 

There can be only one fair, legitimate infer- 
ence from this, and that is, that it is consider- 
ed quite possible that persons not negroes or 
mulattoes — in other words, white persons — may 
happen to be held in slavery in Kansas ; but 
the requirement of the consent of the court 
and security for costs applies to them also; 
and, of course, section l4 adds: "in actions 
prosecuted under this act, the plaintiff shall 
not recover any damages'" from the person who 
has been thus proven to have held him illegally, 
and perhaps for years, in slavery. 

The code also, to be complete, provides for 
slave fogging ly law. By the one hundred and 
twenty-second chapter, on page 454, patrols 
are to be appointed by the county boards, who 
are to visit negro quarters, and to watch un- 
lawful assemblages of slaves. If slaves are 
found at the latter, or strolling from one plan- 
tation to another without a pass, they are to 
suffer ten or twenty lashes. There is one ex- 
ception, and as I desire to do impartial justice 
to this code, I wish to say, to be placed to the 
credit of the men who enacted it, that that 
whipping clause is not to be construed to pre- 
vent slaves going directly to or returning from 
divine worship on the Sabbath. They believe, 
it seems, in the " stated preaching of the Gos- 
pel," and therefore that is excepted. But, sir, 
when visiting, on an adjoining plantation, a 
woman whom her master allows him to call 
his wife, till he chooses to sell her and her 
children to some distant slaveholder, the lash 
is the penalty, unless he is provided with a 
pass. 

The ConMitution speaks of the value and the 
necessity of " a well regulated militia.^'' And 



12 



the bogus Legislature have taken pains to keep 
their militia '• well regulated " indeed. They 
liave not tailed to keep the military force of 
the Territory in tlieir own hands by some re- 
markable provisions, found on page 419, chap- 
ter one hundred and ten, and very truthfully 
entitled " An act to organize, discipline, and 
govern the militia of this Territory." Not one 
tolirary jot or tittle of power is given to the 
people of the Territory to elect even a fourth 
corporal of the militia." The Governor, sir, by 
this law, appoints the generals and the colo- 
nels. The colonels appoint the captains. The 
captains appoint the sergeants, the musicians, 
and the corporals. And all the people have 
to do is to say, Amen ! and train when ordered. 
Precisely such an experiment as this was tried 
in Indiana some years ago, and all went off 
happily and smoothly until it came to the peo- 
ple's turn to train, which all over the State 
they very unanimously declined to do. There 
was no Lecompte in Indiana to indict the 
whole State for treason, and the wliole matter 
passed oti' as an excellent joke, that otfendcd 
no one, officers or people. But a Lecompie 
sits on the Kansas bencli, and to refuse to obey 
this law is treason in his eyes. 

But there is more in this chapter than meets 
the eye at first. It provides, in the first place 
(see page 420), that the Territory shall be di- 
vided into military divisions, and that each 
brigade shall consist of not less than two nor 
more than five regiments. It is not supposa- 
ble, of course, that, in the early settlement of 
the Territory, there will be more than two 
regiments in each brigade, especially as tljere 
are two divisions of militia in the Territory, 
and not less than two brigades in each division. 
And now, sir, if you will turn to section 12, 
page 421, you will find that, by its cunningly- 
devised provisions, one half of the people of 
Kansas are to be under training orders of their 
buperior officers, bound to go wherever those 
officers command them, Ufon the very day of 
the elections in the Territory 1 That clause 
reads — 

"Sbo. 12. That on the last Saturday in the month of 
Angust, in every year, the colonel or commanding officer 
of each regiment and separate battalion shall, by written or 
printed adverUseraent.s, put up or dlslributed fifteen days 
before said day, call out aU company and staff officers 
under his command to rendezvous at some convenient and 
suitable place, where they sliall be formed and drilled in 
company order by the commandant; and at said rendez- 
zona the commandant shall (rive to the officers public notice 
of the place where the regiment or battalion shall meet, 
which place shall be within his district, and the time as fol- 
lows, viz.: the first regiment, or one lowest in number in 
e:ich brigade, shall meet at 10 o'clock in the forenoon on the 
Srst Monday in October," Ac. 

It adds that the next regiment in each bri- 
gade is to meet the ensuing day. 

in order that there may be no misunder- 
standing or denial that, this is the regular elec- 



tion daj', I quote from chapter 66, of the Code, 
page 280 : 

"SkO. 1. On the first Monday in October, In the year one 
thousand eight hundred and fifty-five, and on the first 
Monday in October every two years thereafter, an election 
for delegates to the House of Representatives of the United 
States shall be held at the respective places of holding elec- 
tions, in the Territory of Kansas. 

" Sec. 2. On the first Monday in October, in the year one 
thousand eight hundred and fifty-sLx, and on the first Mon- 
day in October in every year thereafter, an election for 
representatives of the Legislative Assembly, and for all 
other elective offices not otherwise provided for by law, 
shall be held, at the respective places of holding electioDS, 
in this Territory. 

" Sko. 8. On the first Monday in October, in the year one 
thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven, aud on the first 
Slondny in October every two years thereafter, an election 
shall be held, at Uie respective places of holding elections 
for members of the council." 

On the very day of the electron, therefore — 
which in every other State of the Union is 
something like a Sabbath, so far as ordinary 
business is concerned, and men are permitted 
to choose their own officers and legislators as 
they sec fit, untrarameled by any power upon 
earth, and when men, in many States, are, on 
the day of election, exempt from arrest, except 
for felony, to aid to the furthest ^teiit in 
letwing tiie people perfectly free in the exer- 
cise of the freeman's most pricele.ss right, the 
elective franchise — these citizens of Kansas are 
to be summoned forth by their superior offi- 
cers, wherever they may choose to march 
them, subject to the penalties of an instant 
court-martial if they do not obey. For section 
thirteen says, page 423: 

"If a non-commissioned officer, musician, or private, 
shall be guilty of dinobedience of orders, or disrespect to an 
officer, during the time he shall be on duty, he shall be trie! 
by a court-martial, and fined not less than five dollars, nor 
more than twenty dollars." 

There is no provision in this chapter by 
which these officers, appointed by the Gover- 
nor, are to supply the privates with tickets of 
an orthodox character, to be voted under their 
" orders ;" but the selection of election-day for 
training day is a coincidence that is obviously 
not accidental. The authority given by the 
French Generals to the array to vote as they 
plea.'^e, but if they vote, they must vote for 
Napoleon, is to be re-enacted in Kansas ; and 
even if the freemen of Kansas, under training 
orders as they are, should vote as they please, 
despite the reign of terror existing there, and 
the angry denunciations of their officers, 
they can be kept by those officers — as it was 
doubtless intended tliey should be — under 
such orders as will prevent them from pro- 
tecting their ballot-boxes against the invasion 
which is, doubtless, this fall— as so often be- 
fore — to crowd them with fraudulent votes. 

Section thirteen of this same law brings all 
the Sharpens rifles on the ground, where the 
" superior officers " can take possession of them 



13 



•inder color of law, -witbout fear of tLeir con- 
tents : 

"That it shall be the duty of every non-coramUsioned 
officer and private who owns a rifle, musket, or firelock, to 
uiinear with it in good order at every parade. 

The whole country lifts heard, sir, of the 
section iu the election law which allows 
" i>ihaMtants" to vote at the general election, 
without requiring thera to have resided in the 
Territory a single'day ; and of the test oaths to 
sustain the fugitive slave law and the Ne- 
braska bill, which are intended to shut out all 
men opposed to both from the ballot-box. 
And I will quote it from page 282, because I 
desire to contrast its provisions with another : 

"Sec. 11. Every free white male citisi'-n of the United 
States, and' every free male Indian who is made a citizen 
by treaty or otherwise, and over the age of twenty-one 
years, who shall be an inliabitant of this Territory, and 
of the country or district in which he offers to vote, and 
shall have paid a territorial ta.x, shall be a qualified elector 
for all elective officers; and all Indians who are inhabitants 
of this Territory, and who may have adopted the customs 
of the white man, and who are liable to pay taxes, shall be 
deemed citizens: Provided, That no soldier, seaman, or 
marine, in the regular .^rmy or Navy of the United States, 
shall be entitled to vote, by reason of being on service 
therein: And provided further. That no person who shall 
have been convicted of any violation of any provision of 
an act of Congress entitled ' an act respecting fugitives 
from justice, and persons escaping from the service of their 
masters,' approved February 12, 179S ; or of an act to 
amend and supplementary to said act, approved ISth Sep- 
tember, 1850 ; whether such conviction were by criminal 
proceeding or by civil action for the recovery of any penalty 
prescribed by either of said acts, iu any courts of the United 
States, or of any State or Territory, of any oEfense deemed 
infamous, shall be entitled to vote at any election, or to 
hold any ortice in tliis Territory: And provided further, 
T)iat if any person offering to vote shall be challenged 
and required to take an oath or affirmation, to be adminis- 
tered by one of the judges of the election, that he will sus- 
tain the provisions of the above-recited acta of Congress, 
and of tlie act entitled 'An act to organize the Territories 
of Nebraska and Kansas,' approved May 30, 1854, and shall 
refuse to take such oath or affirmation, the vote of such 
person shall be rejected." 

Merely, being an " inhabitant," if the per- 
son is in favor of the Nebraska bill, and of 
tJie fugitive slave law, qualifies him as a voter 
in air tlie elections of the Territory affecting 
national or territorial politics. The widest 
possible door is opened for the invaders to 
come over and carry each successive election 
as "inhabitants" for the time being of the 
Territory. But, turn to page 750, and notice 
tne fi)llo\ving provision (section 8) defining the 
qualitications of voters at the petty corpora- 
tion elections of Lecompte : 

" All free white male citizens who have arrived to the full 
a^e of twenty-one years, and who shall be entitled to vote 
for territorial officers, and who shall have resided within 
the city limits at least six months next preceding any elec- 
tion, and, moreover, who shall have paid a city tax or any 
city license according to ordinance, sliall be eligible to vote 
at any ward or city election for officers of the city." 

Being an inhabitant a day clothes a person 
with the right to vote for Delegate in Con- 
gress, and Kepresentatives in the Legislature ; 
but to vote at an insignificant election, in com- 
parison, six mouths' residence is required ! Am 



I wrong in judging that this inverting the usual 
rule shows that Missourians are wanted at the 
one election, but not at the other? If any one 
deems tliis opinion unjust , let him study the 
following sections of the General Election 
Law, page 283 : 

" Sec. 19. Whenever any person shall offer to vote, he 
shall be presii/med to be entitled to vote. 

" Sec. 20. Whenever any person offers to vote, his vote 
may be challenged by one of the judges, or by any voter, 
and tlie judges of the election may examine him touching 
his right to vote ; and if so examined, no evidence to eoii- 
tradict shall be received." 

Certainly these provisions explain them- 
selves, without ciiinment. 

I will now invite your attention to a con- 
trast in the penal code of this Territory, singu- 
lar in its character, to say the very least. 
Section five of the act punishing olfenses 
against slave property, page 604, enacts as 
follows : 

" If any person shall aid or assist in enticing, decoying, 
or persuading, or carrying away, or sending out of this 
Territory, any slave belonging to .another, with intent to 
procure or effect the freedom of such slave, or with intent 
to deprive the owner thereof of tlie service of such slave, 
he shall be adjudged guilty of grand larceny, and on con- 
viction thereof shall suffer death, or be imprisoned at hard 
labor for not less than ten years. 

A person who, by' a pro-slavery packed jury, 
is convicted of aiding in persuading out of 
the Territory a slave belonging to another, 
is to suffer at least, twice as severe a pe- 
nalty as he who is convicted of committing 
the vilest outrage that the mind of man can 
conceive of on the person of your wife, sister, 
or daughter 1 Nay, the contrast is still strong- 
er. Tiie jury, in the first instance, are autho- 
rized even to inflict tlie punishment of death — 
in the latter, see page 208, the penalty is " not 
less than five years." Such is the contrast in 
Kansas between the protection of a wife's or 
daughter's honor and happiness, and that 
which is thrown as a protecting aegis over the 
property of the slaveholder. 

Again, on page 208, you will find that tbe 
ruSian who commits malicious mayhem, that 
is, without provocation, knocks you down in 
the street, cuts off your nose and ears, and 
plucks out your eyes, is punished " not less 
than five nor more than ten years ;" the same 
degree of punishment that is meted out in 
section seven of the above act, page 605, on a 
person who should aid, or assist, or even 
"harbor" an escaped slave I 

On page 209, you- will find that the man who 
sits at your bedside, when you are prostrated 
by disease, and, taking advantage of your con- 
fidence and helplessness, administers poison to 
you, but whereby death does not happen to 
ensue, is to be punished " not less than five 
nor more than ten years," though it is murder 
in the heart, if not in the deed. And this is pre- 
cisely the same penalty as that prescribed by 



14 



the eleventh section (quoted in my remarks 
above, on the five violations of the constitu- 
tion) against one who but brings into the Ter- 
ritory any bdok, paper, or handbill, containing 
any "sentiment " "calculated " in the ej'es of 
a pro-slavery jury, to make slaves "disor- 
derly." The man who takes into the Terri- 
tory Jefferson's Notes on Virginia, can be 
under this law, hurried away to the chain gang, 
iwid manacled, arm to arm, with the murder- 
ous poisoner. 

On page 210, the Jcidnapping and confine- 
ment of a free white person, for any purpose, 
even, if a man, to sell him into slavery, or if 
a woman, for a still baser purpose, is to be 
punished " not exceeding ten years." Decoy- 
ing and enticing away a child under twelve 
years of age, from its parents, " not less than 
six months, and not exceeding five years." 
But decoying and enticing away (mark the 
similarity of the language) a slave from his 
master, is punislied by dcath^ or confinement, 
no less than ten years. Here is the section, 
page 604: 

" Seo. 4: If any person shall entice, decoy, or carry away 
out of this Territory, any Hlave belonging to another, with 
intent to deprive the owner thereof of the aervices of such 
ilave, or wiih intent to effect or procure the freedom of 
such slave, lie shall be adjudged guilty of grand larceny, 
and, on conviction thereof, shall suffer death, or be impri- 
Boned at hard labor for not less than ten years." 

I had hoped to find time to cite and com- 
ment upon other sections in tliis code, but I 
will quote but one more, showing, that while 
a white man is compelled to serve out the 
penalty of his crime, at hard labor, these slave 
holding legislators have, in their great regard 
for the value of the slave's labor to his master, 
enacted that a slave, for the same offence, shall 
be whipped, and then returned to him. Here 
is the section, which I commend to tlie con- 
sideration of those who, while defending these 
laws, nickname the Republicans " nigger-wor- 
shipers." It is found on page 252 : 

" Sbo. 27 : If any slare shall commit petit larceny, or 
shall steal any neat cattle, sheep, or hog, or be guilty of 
any misdemeanor, or other offence punishable under the 
provisions of this act only by fine or imprisonment in a 
county jail, or by both such fine and imprisonment, he sliall, 
instead of such punishment, be punished. If a male, by 
stripes on his bare back not exceeding thirty-nine, or if a 
female, by Imprisonment in a county jail not exceeding 
twenty-one days or by stripes not exceeding twenty-one, at 
the discretion of the justice." 

Such, sir, is an impartial analysis of the code 
of Kansas, every allusion to which has been 
proven by extracts from the official copy now in 
my liand, and in quoting wliich I have referred, 
in every instance, to the page, the number 
of the section, and its exact words; and I 
think tliat the strong language at the outset of 
my remarks, in which I denounce tiiis dis- 
graceful and tyrannical code, has been fully 
justified by the proofs I have laid before you 



from its pages. Let it not be forgotten, Mr. 
Chairman, that it is because the people of 
Kansas — an overwhelming majority of the 
actual settlers there — refuse to obey these 
enactments passed by a body of men elected 
by armed mobs of invaders — that they have 
been delivered over to persecutions without 
parallel, and to all the horrors of a civil war. 

Had I time, I would desire to refer to the 
history of events in that Territory; to the 
reckless and ruthless violation of plighted faith 
in the repeal of the Missouri compromise, 
which opened the door for legislation like this ; 
to the entire absence of any protection by the 
President to the settlers against personal out- 
rage ; to the repeated invasions by which the 
whole machinary of legisls<tion was usurped, 
but the fruits of which the President upholds 
by cannon and bayonet, with proclamations 
and penalties ; to the causes which led to the 
civil war that has existed in that Territory ; 
to that most aggravating of all insults by which 
the very Jones who headet' an invading party 
of Missourians at one of the polls, and with his 
revolver at the breast of an election judge, 
gave him five minutes to resign or die, was 
commissioned as a sheriff, to ride booted and 
spurred over the people whose rights he had 
thus assisted in striking down ; — and many 
other things that make the blood of the great 
mass of freemen at the North course, as it 
never before coursed, through their veins, 
But I must allude, before concluding, to the 
mockery of relief held out to the people by the 
President and his coadjutors. 

In his special message to Congress, on the 
27th of January last, the President thus 
spoke : 

" Our system affords no justification of revolutionary acts ; 
for the constitutional means of relieving the people of unjust 
administrations and laws, by a change of public agents and 
by repeal, are ample." 

And in his speech, as reported in the UnioD 
of June 10, made to the Buchanan ratification 
meeting, who marched to the White House, he 
coolly told them : 

" There will be, on your part, no appeal to unworthy pas- 
sions, no inflammatory calls for a second revolution, like 
those which are occasionally reported as coming from men 
who have received nothing at the hands of their govern- 
ment but protection and political blessing, no declaration 
of resistance to the laws of the land." 

But I will not stop to allude to the " pro- 
tection and political blessings" which the 
people of Kansas have received from the 
" hands of their Government." It was bitter 
irony indeed. 

Judge Douglas, too, at the same meeting, 
speaking of the Kansas laws, declared as fol- 
lows : 

" Or, if they desire to have any of the laws repealed, let 
them try to carry their point at the polls, and let tb« 
ffligority decide the question." 



15 



Never, sir, was there a more signal instance 
of " holding the word of promise to the ear, 
and breaking h to the hope." Where are the 
*' ample " means of obtaining relief from the 
anendurable tyranny that grinds down the 
free-State men of Kansas into the dust? How 
can they '• carry their points at the polls ?" 
Let facts answer : 

1. The Council, wliich passed these laws, 
has extended its term of service till 1858 ; so 
that, if the entire representative branch was 
unjitiimous for their repeal, the higlier branch 
iias the power to prevent the slightest change 
in tlieni for two long years ! 

2. Tlie free-State men in Kansas are abso- 
lutely siiut out from the polls by test-oaths, 
which no one with the soul of a freeman, who 
traces all the outrages there directly to the 
enactment of the Nebraska bill, can conscien- 
tiiiusly swear to, 

3. Even if they do go there, and swear to 
eu-siain tlie Nebraska bill, and the fugitive 
slave law, the election law is purposely framed, 
as I iiave shown, to invite invasions of Mis- 
sourians, to control the elections in favor of 
slavery. 

4. They are driven from the jury-box as 
well as disfranchised, and prevented from 
acting as attorneys in the courts, unless they 
take the test oath proscribed by their con- 
querors. 

5. Free speech is not tolerated. They 
are left '' perfectly free to form and regulate 
their domestic institutions in their own way," 
except, if they speak a word against slavery, 
they are convicted of felony and hurried to 
the chain-gang. 

6. The presses in the Territory, at Leaven- 
worth and Lawrence, in favor of freedom, 
have been destroyed, and the two last by au- 
thority of the court of Judge Lecompte, thus 
" crushing out " the freedom of the press. 

7. Indictments are found by packed juries 
against every prominent free-State citizen ; 
and those who are not forced to flee from the 
Territory are arrested and imprisoned ; while 
those who have stolen from free-State men, 
tarred and feathered them, burned their 
houses or murdered them, go at large un- 
punished. 

In such a state of affairs as this, to talk of 
going to the polls and having the laws repeal- 
ed is worse than a mockery. It is an insult. 
It is like binding a man hand and foot, throw- 



ing him into the river, and telling him to 
swim on shore and he will be saved. It is 
like loading a man with irons, and then tell- 
ing him to run for his life. The only relief 
possible, if Kansas is not promptly admitted 
as a State, which I hope may be effected, is 
in a change of the Administration and of the 
party that so recklessly misrules the land ; 
and that will furnish an effectual relief. 

As I look, sir, to the smiling valleys and 
fertile plains of Kansas, and witness there the 
sorrowful scenes of civil war. in which, when 
forbearance at last ceased to be a virtue, the 
free-State men of the Territory felt it neces- 
sary, deserted as they were by their Govern- 
ment, to defend their lives, their families, their 
property, and their hearthstones, the language 
of one of the noblest statesman of the age, 
uttered six years ago at the other end of this 
Capitol, rises before my min I allude to the 
great statesman of Kentucky, Henry Clay. 
And while the party which, while he lived, Ut 
the torch of slander at every avenue of his 
private life, and libelled him before the Amer- 
ican people by every epithet that renders man 
infamous, as a gambler, debauchee, traitor, 
and enemy of his country, are now engaged in 
shedding fictitious tears over his grave, and 
appealing to his old supporters to aid by their 
votes in shielding them from the indigtiation 
of an uprisen people, I ask them to read this 
language of his, which comes to us as from his 
tomb to-day. With the change of hut a single 
geographical word in the place of " Mexico," 
how prophetically does it apply to the very 
scenes and issues of this year I And who can 
doubt with what party he would s^tand in the 
coming campaign, if he were restored to us 
from the damps of the grave, when they read 
the following, which fell from his lips in 1850, 
and with which, thanking the House for its 
attention, I conclude my remarks. 



"But If, unhappily, we should be involved in war, In 
civil war, between the two parties of this Confederacy, in 
which the effort upon the one side should be to restrain the 
introduction of slavery into the new Territories, and upon 
the other side to force its introduction there, what a spec- 
tacle should we present to the astonishment of mankind, in 
an effort not to propagate rights, but — I must say it, though 
I trust it will be understood to be said with no design to ex- 
cite feeling — a war to propagate wrongs In the Territories 
thus acquired from Mexico I It would be a war in which 
we should have no sympathies, no good wislies — in which 
all mankind would be against us ; for, from the commence- 
ment of the Revolution down to the present time, we have 
constantly reproached our British ancestors for the IntrO' 
dnction of slavery into this country," 




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Daily Tkikune, is sent to Subscribers, by mail, at $3 per annum ; Two Copies for $5 ; Five Copies 
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good and reliable Newspaper, and there is no Paper which yields so large an amount of valuable 
information for the same amount of money as does The Semi-Weekly Tribune. 

THE NEW-YORK WEEKLY TRIBUNE 

^Circulating over 165,000 Copies, being the largest in the world) is published every Saturday. It 
contains all the Important News of the Day; our best Foreign and Domestic Correspomdence ; full 
Reports of the various Markets ; Reviews of Books and Choice Miscellaneous Selections ; Agricul- 
tural News ; and everything of importance received during the week. It is sent to Subiscribers, by 
mail, at $2 per annum; Three Copies for $5 ; Five Copies for $8i Ten Copies for $12; Twenty 
Copies, when sent to one address, $20; Twenty Copies, or over, to address of each subscriber, $1 20 
each. For a Club of Twenty, or over, we will send an extra copy to the getter up of the club. To 
those enjoying a weekly mail only, we think The Weekly Tribune will prove a profitable and 
welcome visitor. 

Additions may at all times be made to a club at the price paid by those already in it. 

1'lie Weekly tribune continues to be furnished to Clergymen at One Dollar per annum. 

Subscriptions, in all cases, payable in advance. 

GREELEY & McELRATH, No. 154 Nassau St., Nete York. 

CAM PAIGN TRIB U N E . 

We propose to issue a CAMPAIGN TRIBUNE for five months, conmiencing with the proceedings 
r>f the Republican Philadelphia Convention, on June 17, and ending (we hope) with the record of the 
election of its candidates about Nov. 12. And, to insure that this shall be something more than a 
mere fly-sheet, we propose to issue it twice a week, and of the full size of our Daily, Weekly 
and Semi -Weekly editions. We shall thus be able to give all the news of the day, with the best 
Speeches in Congress or elsewhere, Addresses, elaborate Documents, and full detail of all P'iection.s 
and Political Movements throughout this eventful canvass. There will l)e a great many cheap 
Weekly i.ssues for the Campaign, with which we prefer not to compete or interfere ; while we publish at 
the lowest endurable price, one which shall serve as an Encyclopedia of the Canvass and be regarded 
by speakers, committee-men, and active workers for the Right, as a text-book and monitor. We aak 
i.lose who believe such a paper will do good to aid us in extending its circulation. 

TERMS FOR 

THE CAMPAIGN TRIBUNE, 

To bt iifued Tictce a wttk. 

Coramonciiig with the proceedings of the Convention at Philadelphia, about June 20, and ending 
about the .1 'ith of November — say five mouths, or forty -two Numbers : 

Single Coptea $1 00 

lu Copies, to one address. 7 50 

20 Conies, to one address. . . . . , 14 00 

loO Copies, to one address , . . . . . 65 00 ^ 

Ordeis must in all cases be accompanied with the money — which may be remitted at our risk. 
N'otes of all sj-.ecie paying Banks in the United States received at par, but when Drafts on New York, 
Boston or Philadelphia can be procured, they will be preferred. Money letters should be ccrtifi'-d by 
the Postmaster. 

Those of our friends who may desire to aid in the circulation of THE SEMI- WEEKLY CAM- 
PAIGN TRIBUNE will be kind enough to send their orders at as early a day as possible. 
An extra copv will be sent to each person who gets up a club. 

Address ' GREELEY & McELRATH, Tribune Office New York. 

Tkibunb OFriOB, May 23rd, 1866. 



